>Sylvia Ann Hewlett and Cornel West
Both scholars, Cornel West and Sylvia Ann Hewlett share a deeper bond—as working parents who grew up in caring, two-parent families. "I am who I am because of the unconditional love of Mom and Dad," says West, 44, a Harvard professor and author. Says the Welsh-born Hewlett, 51, an economist, mother of four and founder of the 9,000-member National Parenting Association: "My mother was a very hardworking lady, but she had one focus—her family." These days, as West and Hewlett argue in their new book The War Against Parents: What We Can Do for America's Beleaguered Moms and Dads (Houghton Mifflin, $24), even the most well-intentioned parents, with little outside support, are struggling to find the right balance. Something that West—who often played baseball with his father growing up near Sacramento—had only the summers to achieve after losing custody of his son Clifton, now 20. "It's like trying to write poetry after Shakespeare," says West. "You do the best you can."
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